These Things I Know
by fandomlver
Summary: Elena's life changed forever when the Salvatore brothers returned home to Mystic Falls. Most of the time, she doesn't mind.


Author's note: I don't own anyone here. No harm intended. Assume this takes place sometime after the season finale and nothing too damaging to the status quo happens between then and now.

These Things I Know

She watches them sometimes, her boys.

Caroline giggles whenever the topic comes up. Bonnie stares into the distance and refuses to speak until the conversation moves on. Matt does his best to change the subject, trying to spare her.

(Matt stumbled through a conversation along the lines of 'If they hurt you I'll kill them for you' early on, after Vickie went missing. He'd been more worried about Damon at the time, but he included Stefan anyway. She'd smiled, genuinely touched, and promised to call him if she needed to.

She didn't tell him he wouldn't be able to help.)

Elena doesn't care what they think. She doesn't listen when Jenna tries to warn her - or, at least, she listens, because she respects Jenna, but she doesn't hear. Jeremy has stopped trying. The odd friendship Damon carefully cultivated with him may have helped with that. (She'd wondered about that. It wasn't like Damon to take so much care over anything. But he is skilled at the long con.)

She thinks she should be angry at him for using Jeremy like that, but as long as her brother is unharmed, she's happy. And it's good for Damon; Jeremy's the only person who doesn't, on some level, treat him like a bomb about to explode.

Elena understood, very early on, that she and the Salvatore brothers are tied together in a tangled web of destiny and fate. She doesn't mind. The boys have always had a weakness for Pierce girls.

She thinks that maybe they need her. Her or Katherine, the ancestor she can't quite bring herself to hate. (Katherine is evil, ruthless and selfish. Elena knows this. But she turned Stefan and Damon, sent them through time to Elena's side, and she can never be anything but grateful for that.)

To hear them talk about it, they've spent the last hundred and sixty years in a constant state of low-level war, Damon doing his best to destroy anything Stefan built. Since they came home, back to Mystic Falls, they're been working together, supporting each other. Saving each other's lives. Damon can cry self-interest all he likes; his life would be easier if Pearl's vampires had killed Stefan, if he wasn't worrying about his righteous, blood-addicted little brother.

She thinks this may be the closest they've been since they died. She thinks they need a Pierce girl to draw them together, to help them focus on something outside their odd relationship.

She's watching them now, half-hidden on the windowsill in their palatial living room, diary propped against her knees. Stefan is attempting to finish an English essay; Damon, sprawled beside him, is alternately mocking his conclusions and stealing his supplies. Stefan is mostly ignoring him, reclaiming his stationary as needed.

Stefan glances up to catch her eye and she smiles at him. He smiles back, taking his pen from Damon's fingers without really looking at him.

"I miss quills," Damon announces. "So much more elegant."

"And messy," Stefan agrees mildly.

"That's because you, dear brother, never learned to blot properly."

He's smirking at her when she looks up. Elena returns the look steadily. She learned at Halloween not to back down from him.

"You used quills?" she asks as he goes back to playing with Stefan's highlighter. "I thought they were passé when you were born."

"Our father was not a forward thinker," Damon tells the ceiling, head thrown back. "We were Southern gentlemen, and we wrote our letters as a gentleman should."

"With a messy quill," Stefan adds, pulling his notebook off the table just in time to avoid Damon's grab.

"Or dictated to a slave," Damon says thoughtfully.

"Father's slaves couldn't write. If they could, they hid it very carefully. He didn't want them to be educated." Stefan is concentrating very carefully on his homework as he speaks.

"Emily Bennett was very well educated."

"Emily was Katherine's..." Stefan edits himself midsentence. "...friend. Whatever she couldn't or couldn't do had nothing to do with Father."

Elena smiles as she watches them, her light and dark boys. Bright, open Stefan; shadowed, closed-off Damon. Stefan, her soulmate; Damon, her warrior-protector.

Isobel didn't tell her anything she didn't know. Damon isn't subtle. She's been pretty sure since Vickie died again, since he came to her house looking for redemption, looking to help in any way he could. _If this is what you want I'll do it._ She's been sure since they stood in the rain outside Pearl's house, since he held her face in his hands and promised to save Stefan's life. She doesn't think it's all because of Katherine, either. She knows enough about her ancestress to know they're not really at all alike.

Damon wants her. And he's used to getting what he wants. But he loves his brother - at least, he does now - and he's never tried to make her choose.

"Don't you have a date?" Stefan asks, mildly exasperated. Damon's game of keep-away has escalated and he's currently holding Stefan's entire pencil case hostage.

"Are you encouraging me to indulge myself?" Damon asks in mock horror. "I thought you liked it when I was all repressed and boring."

"Since when do you care what I like?"

Damon won't answer that, Elena knows. The easy answer - _I don't_ - is too obviously a lie, and the real answer - _always_ - is too truthful. He won't say it, he'll probably insult Stefan instead – she catches the look on his face and decides to put them both out of their misery.

She slides off the windowsill, crossing behind them to take the pencil case away from Damon. He relinquishes it, pouting, and she musses his hair as she passes. "Behave, boys," she says, giving the case back to Stefan and sitting beside him.

"She wants you to behave," Damon informs Stefan.

"I know exactly what she wants," he says easily.

"Can I watch?"

Elena smirks at him. Damon's stopped trying to shock or embarrass her; he flirts on automatic now. She starts to worry when he's serious.

Dark boy Damon, who loves her enough to kill for her.

Stefan would die for her. He's tried to, in fact, and he'll keep trying no matter how often she begs him not to. He can't help it. Damon...

Damon would (and has, but she tries not to think about that) kill for her, to keep her safe or avenge her. Stefan's the only other person in the world who shares that dubious honour with her. She's never quite sure whether she's grateful for the honour or not.

Damon's been reigning himself in. They all know it. He hasn't killed a human, as far as she knows, since Zach. He hasn't drunk from a human in almost as long. He saved Stefan twice, once from Pearl's followers, once from the blood addiction she herself had triggered. He's almost friends with Alaric. He stays as far away from Bonnie as possible.

He turned Katherine down.

Stefan worries about it, about him. They've talked about it more than once, when they were sure Damon was otherwise occupied and far, far away.

"He's going against his nature," Stefan had protested. "It can't last. I'm worried what he'll do when he snaps back."

"I don't think he's going against his nature," she'd said thoughtfully. "Against his habits, yeah. He's used to being Damon the Big Bad Vampire, taking whatever he wants. But I don't think he's going against his nature." Stefan had shaken his head, but he didn't speak, and she continued more gently, "He loved you. In 1864."

"Yes." No doubt there.

"He still loves you. If we can help him be better, we have to try."

"If we can't?"

"Then we'll deal with it then. Right now we'll take what we can get."

So Damon walks a tightrope he doesn't know he's on, and Stefan and Elena guard him on each side.

Damon snatches her diary suddenly, leaning back out of her reach to study the cover. "Am I in here?"

"You're in my life, aren't you?" she retorts. "Large, terrifying, exhausting parts of my life now revolve around you."

"Ouch. Better check and make sure you're not slandering me, then."

"Libel," Stefan corrects him absently. Damon makes a face, opening the diary at a random page. Elena's watching, though, and he's not actually looking at the words.

"Dear Diary," he 'reads', "today Damon watched us at cheer practise. He looks good in sunglasses. Someday I'd like to...why, Elena," he interrupts himself, tilting his head as though looking over the glasses, "you really shouldn't leave this lying around where anyone can get it if that's the kind of thing you're going to write."

"Give it back," Stefan says without looking up.

"But it's just getting good, little brother."

Stefan finishes his essay, closing his notebook and dropping it onto the table. "There."

"All done?" Elena leans in to kiss him.

"Keep it in the bedroom," Damon advises them briskly.

"Do you want to go out?" Stefan asks, ignoring him. "We've got time before the Grill closes. You can catch up with Bonnie and Caroline."

Elena sits back as she considers, catching Damon's eye as she moves. He's already closing down and she hesitates uncertainly.

"Have fun, kiddies," Damon says blithely. "I'll go find myself someone more interesting."

Stefan starts to protest, knowing exactly what he means, but Elena's ahead of him. She's made her choice. She stands, easing past Stefan to stand over Damon. She holds out a hand and he dutifully passes her the diary.

She drops it on the table and sits between them. There isn't much space; she's pressed against both of them. Stefan's very still but he smiles when she looks at him, lacing his fingers through hers.

Damon's watching them; Elena's fairly sure he isn't breathing. On anyone else, the expression on his face would probably be amazement. On him it's closer to disbelief.

Elena reaches for his hand; he doesn't resist, but it lies limp on her thigh.

She studies him for a moment before smiling. She's never been afraid of Damon, not really. Necklace or no, she's never believed he wants to hurt her.

"Let's stay in tonight," she says finally. Damon nods, fingers finally tightening around hers, and she settles back, relaxing.

It won't last forever, she knows. Eventually she'll have to change, or leave them behind. Damon might decide to leave them; she doesn't think he will, but he does make a habit of going against her expectations. Stefan may even leave; if his addiction raises **its** head again she thinks he'll run rather than face them.

But none of that will happen tonight. Tonight, as her dark and light boys bicker over the TV remote – Damon favours reality TV, Stefan some kind of comedy – she's content to simply sit and enjoy their company.

Nothing lasts forever, but sometimes one perfect moment is enough.


End file.
